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The whole world loves neophyte athletic tight end Jimmy Graham from Miami with the 95th pick. "Best pick in the draft,'' one AFC coach told me. "Give him time, and in that offense, he'll be better than [Jeremy] Shockey by the start of next year.''

“We know that no matter the adversity, be it the lockout, be it the suspension or be it a hurricane, our men will pull together and defend the honor of this city. We’ve shown we’ve been able to do that.” - Jabari Greer

This is surprising to me. I know that he was struggling in practice, and didn't play well vs. San Fran.. but you would have figured with the premium Payton puts on having veterans and continuity we would have let him work his issues out.

This cut tells me the coaches felt Stinchcomb's injury had effected him too severely to the point his play would not improve over time. So now it will be either Strief, Charles Brown, or the newcomer Jordan Black. My money is on Strief as he has experience starting on this O-line before.

Well this will be an interesting season to say the least. I'm pretty satisfied with the off-season. However I do wish the team would have added another OLB, and DE to the mix. (maybe they still will when other teams make their final cuts)

I do think Special teams has improved considerably adding guys like Amaya, Joe Morgan, Herring (who's a special teams specialist) and I do think our Running game will be fine once we get into the reg season, on our 1st drive of Houston we were getting good push and solid gains.. I think Oakland was more about Payton and Brees trying to get the Passing game some action to make sure we were in sync.

My main concern is at OLB, and DE... Alex Brown was not impressing and therefore released, I do believe Cam Jordan will eventually step up and handle that position but he's only gotten sparse work with the 2nd, 3rd team Defensive units thus far.. I'm wondering if he hasn't fully grasped the Defense yet? Other than that we have McBride, Charleston, Galette. I'd to see one more body added to the mix.

At OLB it looks like Shanle will still get the nod at either WLB, or SLB, if he starts at SLB I believe that means Casillas won the Will spot. If not it will probably be Shanle, Vilma, Herring the same lineup the started at Oakland, not exactly confidence inspiring but that's who the coaches trust. I do think we'll see a much more aggressive Defensive philosophy once the season starts and Greg Williams starts unleashing his personnel packages to their full extent, also hopefully we'll have Aubrayo Franklin back at DT.

Well Chicago is a team that historically under Payton we don't play well against.. but all 3 of our previous meetings have been on the Road. This time we play them at Home.

I hate that we lost Colston for a while, and if Moore misses this one as well I'm worried about our passing game.. those are our reliable possession guys, that work the underneath routes and middle of the field. If so we'll probably see a lot more designed Pass plays to the Running backs, possibly Jimmy Graham gets more looks.

Really though it comes down to our Defense HAS to play better than what they showed in Week 1. We have to stop Forte, and get off the field.

Going into Chicago our defense MUST step up. Our front four has to create pressure some kind of way to free up the linebackers to do their thing. Casillas, although he struggles shedding blocks, is clearly our best LB outside of Vilma. On offense, Meachem definitely needs to step up since it looks like our WR's will be him, Henderson, Arrington, and Roby. Definitely nothing for opposing defenses to be afraid of which means it frees up another DB or LB to blitz.

The offensive line also needs to get a stronger push in the running game. I'm starting to question the starting of Kreutz over Tennant. While Kreutz is a savvy veteran, his lack of push in the running game is questionable as is his pass blocking. Bushrod also doesn't get as strong of a push as he needs to in the running game, which isn't anything new.

Our offense did start clicking after the first quarter but without our defense stepping up this could be a LOOOOOOONG season.

Yes we all know from Week 2 in Pre-season how Dangerous Houston is, and they will definitely be a step up in Offensive pressure than what Chicago brought... not exactly Green Bayesque but close, and they are a better run team.

Looking at the positive side, we will be at Home. We'll likely have Will Smith back, and Tracy Porter as well. (although I don't know how much that helps with the way he has been tackling lately.) Houston does seem to be banged up.

This will most likely be a dog fight regardless however, hopefully we'll be able to stop them enough times.. or at least get some turnovers.